Estate in land

An estate in land is an interest in real property that is or may become possessory.

In the legal systems of almost every country, the ultimate true "owner" of all land is the sovereign, which for a republic is the whole people of a society, which with sovereign, exclusive dominion over a well-defined tract of land, may be called a "state". Private parties own not the underlying land, but claims on parcels of land, which taken together define the estate for that parcel. This superior ownership is the basis for taking the land through eminent domain. However, the claims that define the estate are themselves personal property.

This should be distinguished from an "estate" as used in reference to an area of land, and "estate" as used to refer to property in general.

In property law, the rights and interests associated with an estate in land may be conceptually understood as a "bundle of rights" because of the potential for different parties having different interests in the same real property.

Estates in land can be divided into four basic categories:

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